Turtle Island Quotes

“Ghost Dancers Rise: At the 500th anniversary of Columbus's landing, tribal leaders gathered in Washington, DC, for a ceremony in front of the Capitol. They could have dwelt on the catastrophes that were Columbus's legacy, but instead they closed the ceremony with these words:

We stand young warriors
In the circle
At dawn all storm clouds disappear
The future brings all hope and glory,
Ghost dancers rise
Five-hundred years.”
― Eldon Yellowhorn, Kathy Lowinger

“When writing on the subject of civilization, one must understand that the ability to read or write a European language does not create a superior civilization. Nor does the ability to point exploding sticks that cause instantaneous death or injury, or to launch missiles that could blow the world apart, provide a moral basis to declare one’s culture more civilized than another. The question to ask when judging the values and merits of a civilization must always be: “How does the civilization respond to the human needs of its population?” By this standard, because they created social and political systems that ensured personal liberty, justice and social responsibility, most Amerindian civilizations must be given very high marks.

When making an unbiased assessment, and comparing the values of early American civilizations with those of European civilizations, one cannot but find that the suppression and wanton destruction of American civilizations by European civilizations was in many ways a case of inferior civilizations overcoming superior ones. This is especially true in the area of respect for human rights. Although they were not as technologically advanced as the Europeans were by 1492, many Amerindian Nations possessed democratic political practices that were light years ahead.”
― Daniel N. Paul, We Were Not the Savages: First Nations History ? Collision Between European and Native American Civilizations

“The name America was not invented to change the identity of a place previously called Turtle Island; rather, the name Turtle Island was invented to change the identity of a place called America.”
― Adam Kirsch, On Settler Colonialism: Ideology, Violence, and Justice

“The scientific descriptions of ethnology that we find in books are inevitably dry and do not give the least impression of the mysterious world of the Achumawi, whose life is so inextricably mixed in with the animals, the trees, the plants.
But without forming some mental picture of that life, it is, I believe, almost impossible to understand how and to what extent the Achumawi Indian finds himself in a state of direct mystical connection with the universe that surrounds him.
Now that is precisely his religion, and his entire religion.” — Jaime de Angulo
from
"Tracks Along the Left Coast"
by Andrew Schelling”
― Jaime de Angulo

“The scientific descriptions of ethnology that we find in books are inevitably dry and do not give the least impression of the mysterious world of the Achumawi, whose life is so inextricably mixed in with the animals, the trees, the plants. But without forming some mental picture of that life, it is, I believe, almost impossible to understand how and to what extent the Achumawi Indian finds himself in a state of direct mystical connection with the universe that surrounds him. Now that is precisely his religion, and his entire religion.”
— Jaime de Angulo

Appears in the introduction of "Tracks Along the Left Coast" by Andrew Schelling”
― Jaime de Angulo

“You say that to (Franz) Boas science is "austere and impersonal." You know, that is just the thing that gets my goat. They have managed to take all the life out of science. Why be ashamed of the joy and the exaltations that are the blood of knowl-edge? Why pretend that you have no emotions? In another century they will look aghast at the funereal aspect of our science. They will say: those people were doing penance for something! ... We have driven our libido underground.”
— Jaime de Angulo, written in a letter to his friend and mentor, the linguist Edward Sapir

(Appears in the introduction to "Tracks Along the Left Coast" by Andrew Schelling)”
― Jaime de Angulo